How Many Voices Can It Have
by Starman3569
Summary: Even if the voices are not real, they have pretty good ideas!


Disclaimer: The characters aren't mine. The only reason this even came to mind is because the writers killed off one of my favorites, thus she must return.

Eli drew the short straw on Saturday night – 2200 to 0600 on the bridge all by himself. No one to talk to, no one to bounce ideas off of. Just him. After the Eden Eight came back to Destiny, it wasn't so bad though. Everyone with half a clue, including Eli, got their Captain Picard "engage!" imitations out of their systems in the first two days after the bridge was discovered.

The danger to being alone and in touch with Destiny's inner child manifested itself to Eli at 0235 hours. He had gone to the mess hall to grab a fruit, an as-yet unnamed fruit, and a cup of water. When he sat down in the central chair, he took half a minute to look over the controls and make sure the ship had done nothing crazy while he was away.

"Hello, Eli," a voice said from the far left bridge station. Fortunately for Eli, he had finished his water, because the cup flew from the chair to the ring of stations four or five meters in front of him. "No need to be jumpy."

Ginn was seated in the chair, turned away from the window to face Eli. "What... the... hell!"

"You say that a lot," Ginn said. "Here by yourself, I see."

"You're..."

"Yes, I'm dead. But am I really me?"

It didn't take Eli long to figure out what happened. "You're the ship fucking with me." Eli tried to be sly and pressed a few buttons on the console that called up the ship's memory usage. There was a program running that started while he was in the mess hall that consumed half the memory of the one that affected Colonel Young.

"I wouldn't say that. I would say that I'm a voice among others that thinks a different approach is needed. Find what you were looking for?"

"Not really. A different approach to what? Driving us all insane?"

Ginn tilted her head a bit. "Eh, that might be a side effect, I suppose. What's tonight's project? You're not just sitting a watch. Then again, sitting a watch would mean you'd probably be asleep while everyone else is... what are they doing anyway?"

"Sleeping or getting drunk. Brody found something that ferments better in his still."

"And that's fun?"

"More fun than sitting here talking to a figment of my imagination, however brilliant that imagination may be."

"Oh, come on. What's your project tonight? Tell me!"

"Same as it has been since we found this place. Stop the clock."

"That's easy," Ginn said. An hour popped up on the countdown clock, and it immediately started running down. "Press the red button."

Eli looked at the right control panel. One of the normally white buttons was glowing bright red. "Yeah, sure. You want me to blow it up?"

"I promise. Press that button and you'll stop the clock. I'd stop it because something bad might happen at the end of the time. Or you can figure it out on your own and I won't help."

Eli sighed and unadvisedly hit the button. The clock stopped with about 59 and a half minutes remaining. "That's not all that difficult to do."

"You're right, it's not," Ginn said. The clock blanked out. Eli noticed a program on the memory usage log ended at the same time.

"You're being nice to me. You weren't so nice to Colonel Young."

"Are you making the assumption that I speak for the ship, Eli?"

"You are the ship."

Ginn shook her head. "Not quite. Destiny has more than one voice. Two of them haven't been so nice to Dr. Rush either. Does he really deserve anyone being nice to him though?"

"He's not a sweetheart," Eli said with a touch of venom in his voice.

"No, he isn't." Ginn closed her eyes for a couple seconds. "You need to ask your friend who turned the ship around about three things in her equations. Heta, Sigma, and Omega. If you know the correct question to ask, you'll be setting the countdown in no time."

Eli turned to the right to key in the three items. Just as he did, he heard the bridge door open. As he glanced back to the left, Ginn was gone.

"Hey," Dr. Park said as she walked around the outer ring of the bridge, "couldn't sleep. What's on the program?"

"Looks like there might be some gates coming up," Eli said. "Want to see if there's anything worth flipping these three switches to see?"


End file.
